Lately I wonder
by HeavenStar2703
Summary: [NaruSaku] Because even if she could run a thousand miles from him, she could not run from her own heart... Because even if he could move on, she could not. So she wondered...


**Lately, I wonder…**

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><p>Lately, Sakura wondered how she came to love Naruto, as a woman loved a man.<p>

She couldn't begin to guess when she began to view Naruto as something other than a cherished friend. Was it after the last war? Probably longer than that.

The feeling she had for Naruto now had most probably manifested itself through all the time they spent together, each of them working together, laughing together, crying together, growing together…

And being there for each other together…

Through the darkest hour they had pushed each other forward. Through the terrible times of loss they had held onto each other. Through all the ache and pain, they had endured together. The bond between them stood the test of time and overcame any challenge thrown in their way.

But in the beginning, it was the bond of friendship. It was pure and simple. It was wonderful.

So what had changed? Sakura asked herself.

Was it him? Probably not. The Naruto she knew, and loved, was as constant as the sunrise in the morning.

So it was, by deduction, her that had changed.

And she was scared witless by it.

* * *

><p>Lately, Sakura wondered how his hands would feel upon her body.<p>

It seemed wrong to think of him this way, she knew in her heart of hearts as she watched him and Hinata walking together. She felt guilt piercing her heart even more agonizingly as she watched him smile so brightly at _her_, a woman whom he barely spent time with before. A woman he barely knew or understood.

Then, she recoiled from herself in utter disgust for the ill feelings she had unintentionally directed toward the Hyuuga Heiress. Before this, Sakura had always admired Hinata. She thought of her as a friend, a kind girl who was invariably kind to everybody, a girl with a pure heart not unlike _his_. Truly, it was someone like her that was deserving of _him_, someone so gentle, someone so selfless, someone so caring…

Someone she could never be…

Yet, she had lain awake many nights, dreaming of his sharp, angular face with the familiar whiskered marks. She dreamt of his sky blue, hopeful eyes sparkling in the dim moonlight, dreamt of his lips curving up into playful smiles, dreamt of his callous hands and what they could do to her.

She dreamt of his throaty voice, calling out her name as he held her in his arms.

Such dreams should bring her pleasure, but now they were nothing but nightmares to her.

And she was tortured relentlessly by them.

* * *

><p>Lately, Sakura wondered if she would go back to Konoha this year.<p>

It has been a year since she surreptitiously left the only home she had ever known in her entire life in the dead of the night, leaving on the Sixth Hokage's desk a leave-taking form, so that she wouldn't be branded a missing-nin, and a letter with barely an explanation of why she left. Honestly, she couldn't even remember what she wrote, but she doubted it would be adequate anyway.

But she had a hunch that while her sensei might not understand why, her shishou would, judging from the way her eyes would turn sad when she watched her watched _him_. How she would secretly let out a sigh when she thought Sakura was no longer around. How forlorn she had looked as she endured another parallel played out before her eyes once more, only this time with different characters.

Yet, Sakura did not want her sympathies, even less so her pity, and she knew her shishou understood it so completely that it did not surprise her that no one was sent after her to bring her back. She understood that Sakura needed time, and she trusted that once she was ready, she would come home. The home that she had loved with every fiber of her being, the home that she longed for with every step that she took further away from it.

But she wasn't ready. Not now. She wasn't ready to go back and face the empty home where her parents used to be before they left her forever. She wasn't ready to go back and see Naruto and Hinata engaged. She wasn't ready to be alone among all the blooming happiness in Konoha.

And she was aching unbearably every time she thought of it.

* * *

><p>Lately, Sakura wondered if she should go back to Konoha at all.<p>

It had been two years since she left her home, leaving her broken heart behind. She had waited and hoped that time would heal it from the tragedies it suffered from. While some of her pain were slowly alleviating, there was one that remained, latching itself stubbornly into the remnants of her heart.

The pain that she came to know well as regret.

Even though she was travelling far and wide, she would ask for news from Konaha from villages and cities she passed through. She was always eager for the news as she longed to know how her friends were doing. And she was truly delighted to hear the news of Ino's marriage to Sai and Shikamaru's to Temari.

Yet, at the same time, she dreaded hearing the news about the one person in particular. She made a point to steer the conversation in other directions as soon as _his_ name was mentioned. Oh, she did ask enough to know that he was well and happy, but that was enough for her. More than that, she did not need, did not want to know.

She could not bear to know.

Yet, despite all her efforts to avoid the subject, one day, as she sat in a quiet sweet shop on an unfrequented road, she overheard a small, unusual group of kunoichi talking. Since the shop was so small, there was no way she could avoid hearing the content of their conversation sitting there, and she could not leave in time.

"Did you hear?" One of the young kunoichi with the hidden sand hitai-ate spoke with a youthful, romantic enthusiasm that she herself used to have. "The Hero of Konoha is getting married next month!"

She couldn't leave soon enough, then. She slapped some money on the table she was sitting and practically ran out of the shop, ignoring curious stares the waitresses gave her and her untouched order. She ran, ran and ran until she felt her knees gave way somewhere far, far away, as far as possible from where she heard the news.

And she was shattered irrevocably even before a lone tear could escape her eye.

* * *

><p>Lately, Sakura wondered how small the world was.<p>

It was three years since she left Konoha, and where her heart once ached and longed for the familiar sight and sounds, it was now almost completely hardened to such things. Or so she thought, until she was walking through a far-off village one morning and felt someone watching her. She turned to find the blonde with light blue eyes staring intently at her.

Sakura felt her mouth gaped opened in surprise. This was the last person she expected to see in such as faraway place.

It was Ino.

Then, faster than lightning, she was on top of her, smothering her in a bone-crushing hug with tears streaming down her face while she couldn't stop spouting out her best friend's name. Sakura's deadened heart twitched painfully, and the tears she thought had dried up long ago started to brim in the corner of her eyes.

"Idiot forehead! Where in the hell have you been all this time?!" Ino kept shouting into her best friend's ear as she pointedly ignored all the people gathering to watch them on the ground, wondering what on earth was two woman doing together on the ground. Ino didn't care what they thought.

Sakura didn't care either. All she could do was whisper a broken '_sorry, sorry_' into her best friend's ear over and over again as she let the tears fall freely from her face for the first time since the day she ran from the sweet shop.

It was some time before both women regained their composure, got up from the ground, and found some more secluded spot to talk, to listen, to inquire, to worry, to fret, to reacquaint themselves of what had been going on in each other's lives and to reestablish the friendship that never needed reestablishing.

Morning passed and midday came, midday also passed and afternoon came. Then, even afternoon passed and sunset came, and it was time for Ino to go.

"I wish I'm not on this stupid mission." The blonde grumbled as she picked up her bag, preparing to leave from the inn where Sakura had her lodging. "It felt like we haven't managed to talk about anything at all!"

Sakura laughed for the first time in years as she retorted. "It was all we have been doing all day, Ino pig! I'm surprised either of us still have any voice left!"

Ino smirked and mockingly tsk-ed her friend. "You should know better than that, forehead!"

Then the both of them giggled together like schoolgirls once more as they walked to the front of the cheap inn Sakura was staying at. Suddenly, Ino's expression became sober as she turned to her long-missing friend.

"Sakura," she began. "When will you come back? We have all missed you terribly."

Her voice was devoid of any accusation or blame, only concern and understanding, and Sakura had almost forgotten how good it felt to have someone worrying over her. But, regretfully, Sakura could only smile back at her friend and shook her head.

"I don't know, Ino… I… I know it has been a long time, and I should go back. I know I'll always have a place there, but…"

"You're afraid." The blonde candidly pointed out. "What are you afraid of, Sakura?"

Sakura opted to remain silent on the matter. Seeing her friend remained tight-lipped on the matter, Ino sighed dejectedly, then swung her pack over her shoulders and turned to leave.

Only to find herself being hugged from behind by her tearful friend.

"I'm sorry, Ino." She croaked out the words. "I'm sorry."

They stood like that for a long time before she heard Sakura hesitantly started.

"Tell Hinata… Tell her that I… I wish her all the happiness in the world."

Before Ino could react, Sakura left her, running wildly back to her rented room, uncontrollable tears flowed from her eyes.

And she was bleeding liberally from the old wound in her heart all over the place.

* * *

><p>Lately, Sakura wondered how fate must have been conspiring against her.<p>

It was a month after her encounter with Ino. When her best friend left, Sakura checked out immediately and travelled even further in the exact opposite direction of Konoha, determined never to go back again. Knowing Ino, she would have guessed immediately what was in her own heart, and Ino being Ino, she would do _something_ about it. Sakura hadn't dared to think about the consequences. She dreaded the reactions of Hinata if this was made known to her. She dreaded the reactions of Naruto if this was made known to him.

And she dreaded what would happen to them when they learnt that their hard-won happiness, the happiness she selfishly couldn't stand to witness, was the cause of her self-imposed exile from her beloved home.

She simply couldn't stand it if they thought of her as a selfish, jealous person unworthy of their friendship, even more so if their happiness was to be marred by this.

It was all that she had left to hold onto.

And so she did what she had become highly proficiently with. She ran, ran without looking back, ran without sending her directions as she promised Ino. She travelled further and further, pushing herself to a punishing pace as if there were demons chasing her.

Well, indeed, there were. They were her own demons, after all.

A week later, she had reached a remote village unknown to her. It wasn't even located on a detailed copy of shinobi-grade map that she owned. It must have been either too small to be worthy of notice, or far too remote for anyone to take note of it. Both scenarios suited her just fine, as she needed a place to lay low, and she was already starting to feel the effect of last week travelling and sorely needed to settle and rest for a bit.

She was warmly received by the friendly villagers, and was even more heartily welcomed once they knew she had some medic skills to speak of. They hadn't heard of the Godaime's apprentice before and stared at her blankly when she asked them how they were impacted by the Fourth Shinobi War a few years back. In fact, the last contact they had with the outside world had been almost a decade ago, when she wasn't even made genin yet.

Truly, she couldn't pick a more isolated place on earth to be in right now, and she felt a degree of safety returning to her life. She was given an abandoned, old cottage as a place to stay, and a few older ladies had come to help her cleaned the place and make it habitable. They brought her food and basic necessities with smiles, requiring nothing as thanks.

So she repaid them by healing their sick and wounded without taking anything in return, either. It gave her comfort to actually be able to use her skills as medic nin regularly once again. Moreover, the kindness of the people here impressed her, reminded her of a place she longed for but felt she couldn't return to. Thus, she was reluctant to move on.

So, instead of staying for only a few days as she had originally planned, her stay had stretched into a week, then ten days, and before she knew it, she had already been here for almost a month, which was the first time she had stayed put in one place for so long. The people here weren't even pressing her into staying, which was probably what made her complacent, made her careless.

One star-filled evening, Sakura was sitting in the little cottage with an ancient oil lamp as the only source of lighting. She was brewing the concoction for the children that had caught mild cold in this winter air. As more children than she expected took ill, she had been busy during the day tending to them and was only free just now. She was so focusing on adding the mixture of herbs into her medicine that she was surprised when the front door was suddenly opened.

She looked up, thinking it must have been one of the village women who brought news of an emergency, only to find the blonde with light blue eyes staring intently at her.

And she was falling perilously up into the bottomless skies that were his eyes once again.

It was Naruto.

And she was stunned blindingly as if she had been exposed to the sun for the first time after years spent in the depth of darkness.

* * *

><p>Lately, Sakura wondered if fate had intended for her life to turn out this way after all.<p>

Naruto stood at her door, his eyes never leaving her as her own took in the sight of him, disbelieving what she was seeing.

He seemed older, she absentmindedly noted, and his hair was shorter than she remembered. His shoulders became broader than she had ever seen, and his build became more muscular. In the darkness, the dimming light from the oil lamp clearly outlined the sharp angle on his face.

There had been no words spoken by either of them, but by the time their eyes met, nothing needed to be said.

And then, for the lack of better words, he fell on her like a vengeance. He crossed the threshold and pushed the old rickety desk that stood between them aside with a simple swing of his arm, and in the next instant as the light went out and curtain of darkness draped over them, she was crushed into his powerful embrace and his lips found hers.

The shreds of her morality left inside her scattered brain told her to stop this now before it went too far, before they were past the point of no return. She lifted her hands against his hard chest as if to shove him away, but found no strength to make the push. It rested limply there as she reveled at the warmth emanating from there underneath her palm. His heat, his fire, they distracted her, and she couldn't think clearly.

She barely noticed how she became trapped against the wall or when his body became her prison, melding into her own as if it belonged there. It moved as if it had the every right to explore, to feel, to dominate hers as if it were his own. She jolted uncontrollably as his hand moved to the small of her back and pushed her even closer into himself.

Then his soft, soft lips parted from hers and made a path from her cheek down to her neck. She cried out as he found her sensitive spot and sucked… hard. Then he had the gall to smirk at her reaction and held her even tighter if that was even possible.

His hand then began to wander, down and down it went from cupping her cheek to tracing her jawline, then further as it cupped her tender breast, kneading it experimentally. As he garnered gasps and moans from her, he became more confident and playful with his touch, teasing her, leaving her in a state of heightened sensitivity that almost drove her mad. It made her delirious. It made her forget who she was, where she was. All she could perceive was him, the infuriating man who had her in the palm of his hands, literally.

She rasped out his name weakly as his hand at her back moved even lower and she felt her knees buckled. He murmured soft, meaningless reassurances into her ears as he continued to study her body's reaction to his administration. She whimpered pleadingly as he brushed his fingers over her sensitized nipple under all her clothes. Then he decided that they were in the way and unneeded for the rest of this evening.

Sakura hazily mused how quick he got rid of her blouse and bindings, despite the challenges the endless knots and buttons posed to his deft fingers. She briefly wondered where he learnt such techniques, and then the thought sobered her instantly.

This time, she found the strength to push him back.

As if suddenly aroused from stupor, Naruto's hazy eyes unclouded instantly as he was pushed from her. In that exact moment, she could see it plainly, the question and the hurt present in his expression as he whispered her name aloud.

"Sakura-chan…" He hesitated, not knowing what to say, so she spoke first.

"Hinata." She bit out the name as if it were a safe-word, a mantra, something that would stop her from plunging headlong into the sweet dark path laid before her. "You and Hinata…"

Naruto seemed confused for a moment, then understanding dawned in his eyes. Sakura lowered hers so she did not have to see his expression, afraid of what she would see there. She kept her eyes downcast as she said.

"You should go back to her, Naruto… We… I mean…"

She was cut short as she felt his arms around her once more. Surprised, she almost looked up to him, but her mind screamed out in fierce warning to not do so. So she squeezed her eyes shut as she stiffened against his warmth surrounding her body.

"I did not marry her, Sakura-chan." Naruto whispered quietly into her ears as he tightened his arms around her. "I am not with her anymore."

Startled and thoroughly shocked at the admission, her eyes widened twice its normal size and stared at him incredulously, wondering if what he said could be true, wondering if this was just her mind playing tricks on her, hearing only what she wanted to hear.

"It's true, Sakura-chan." He said while resting his head on her shoulder, drawing her body closer into his own. "Maybe I am a fool. They are certainly calling me a fool, the ones back home, you know?"

Sakura felt her breath hitched in her throat as she listened to the familiar sound of his voice that she missed so much.

"They said I was throwing away a treasure, and that I'll never have a chance like that again, that I'll never find a girl like her again. They said she's beautiful and kind, an angel in every conceivable way, and I should be glad she thought I deserve her."

Sakura listened in stunned silence, but she felt her body relaxed and leant in closer to his.

"But you know what? I told them that it's fine. I told them I don't deserve her. I told them I don't need a girl like that. I told them that even if she is an angel, she isn't the one that I want."

He paused, and used his thumb to brush away to the lone tear that slipped from her eyes. "Let me tell you about the girl that I want, Sakura-chan. You see, she has this charming, lovely forehead that I've wanted to kiss for a very long time. She can be violent and scary sometimes, and she scolds and nags me all the time if I'm not doing things right."

She felt her cold, dead heart starting to beat again. Even amidst the darkness, she thought her world was alighted once more.

"But underneath all that, I know how much she worries about me. She always looks out for me and takes care of me. She is the one who accepted me first. She always understands me best. She is the reason I keep working harder and harder. She is the reason I want to become stronger, so that I can protect her, and maybe kiss her forehead without her pummeling me into the next week."

That earned him a half-hearted smack on his shoulder. Naruto chuckled at the half-naked girl in his arms and asked her again.

"Tell me, Sakura-chan. Have you seen her?"

Sakura burst into tears immediately.

"Idiot, idiot Naruto! Why? Why do you have to love someone so selfish? Why do you have to love someone as undeserving as me?" She sobbed into his shoulder as he gently rocked her as if she was child.

"Because I do. I don't know why and I don't care."

"She would be so good to you. She would make you so happy." She insisted, but her voice held no conviction.

"She wouldn't." Naruto said resolutely. "She could never make me as happy as you do."

More tears came unbidden to her eyes, and he tenderly kissed them away as her crying subsided. He exhaled the breath he had been holding in unconsciously as he said to her.

"Sakura-Chan, say it." His voice shook with emotions as he pressed his forehead against hers. "I need to hear you to say it."

Sakura looked into his eyes and caressed his cheek with her cold, shaking fingers and finally said what she hid deep within her heart for so long.

"I love you."

Then, they spoke to each other through the rest of the night with no more words.

And she was thanking fate fervently for bringing them back together, and then she was no longer thinking of anything but the man in front of her.

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><p><em>The End<em>

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><p><strong>Author's Note<strong>

At first, this was going to be a long story of probably 10 chapters. However, time constraint posed a major obstacle to this project. Plus I'm unsure if there's anyone still wanting to read something like this, so I reduced it to this instead. Please consider it a belated Christmas or an early New Year piece from me.

While it may not be something as spectacular as many other pieces already available here, I tried my best. Hopefully it was good enough to at least makes you feel something while reading this. And if you think it is worth your time, please leave me review. I'd dearly love to know what you think about this, and that'd be something like a Christmas/New Year gift from you to me :)

Also, blatant advertising: there is my other NaruSaku one-shot series: **Sakura-chan's Homemade Meals**. Please read and review if you like NaruSaku!

And, shameless advertising: my NaruSakuSasu multi-chapter story: **Somewhere I will find you**. Written from the heart, consisted of dramatic plot and occasional grammatical errors and misspellings.

Merry Belated Christmas and Happy New Year in advance, all!


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